Silence.
It wasn't the empty silence of his house, which still held the echo of a ticking clock or the hum of a refrigerator. This was an absolute silence, a pure absence of sound so profound his ears rang, searching for a frequency that wasn't there.
Arka opened his eyes and saw nothing but white. An endless white above, below, and all around him. There were no walls, no floor, no ceiling. He was floating in a sterile nothingness. He tried to scream, but there was no air to draw into his lungs, and no sound escaped his throat. A cold panic began to creep through what no longer even felt like a body.
Time lost all meaning. He didn't know if a week, a month, a year, or a century had passed. The memories of the dirty alley, the burning pain, and the red stone necklace slowly faded, eroded by the endless void. His sanity began to fray at the edges, fiber by fiber. He was starting to forget who he was.
Until, in the midst of that white ocean, a black dot appeared in the distance.
A hope so powerful it was painful exploded within him. He "ran" toward it, moving his imaginary limbs with all his remaining will, but the dot remained impossibly far away. Just as despair began to grip him again, the black dot suddenly rushed forward, growing until it consumed his entire vision. A voice, not heard with his ears but whispered directly into the core of his consciousness, spoke with ancient weight.
"Go… to Orlando… take… and… destroy…"
Instantly, the nothingness shattered.
Arka awoke with a violent gasp, cold, damp air flooding his lungs in a greedy, painful breath. He coughed violently, his body curled up on a stone floor that felt real and shockingly cold against his skin. Darkness surrounded him, but it was a living darkness, thick with the smell of wet earth and musty moss. He could feel his own heartbeat thrumming against his ribs—a sensation he had forgotten.
Fumbling, he got to his feet. His muscles felt foreign, but strong. He stumbled toward a sliver of dim light in the distance, like a newborn learning to walk.
Arka stepped out of the mouth of the cave, his unaccustomed eyes blinking in the glare. The sight that greeted him stole his breath. He was standing on the verge of a colossal forest. Trees soared into the sky, taller than any skyscraper he had ever seen, their trunks so massive that dozens of adults couldn't have encircled one. The air was filled with the scent of wild, untamed life. This wasn't a fantasy from his comics. This was something far older, far wilder, and far more real.
Suddenly, the silence was broken by a low growl and the sharp crack of a bone snapping. Arka's heart skipped a beat. From behind a giant thicket, he witnessed a stage of death. A snow-white fox with seven tails fanned out behind it like a torn silver fan was locked in a deadly dance. Its opponent was a mountain of muscle and fury—a giant white tiger with two long fangs curving from its jaw like ivory daggers.
This was no quick battle; it was a brutal war of attrition. The fox moved with impossible grace, darting and weaving to evade the tiger's devastating lunges, leaving sharp gashes with its claws whenever it saw an opening. But the tiger's strength was overwhelming. A single successful swipe of its paw tore into the fox's shoulder, sending it crashing against a tree. Bright red blood sprayed across its pure, silver fur.
Both were now dying. Their breaths came in ragged, heavy gasps, their white coats matted with blood—their own and their enemy's. They stood a few meters apart, staring at each other with hatred, gathering the last of their strength for one final, decisive strike.
But the attack never came.
A soft tremor ran through the ground, followed by a heavy rustling that made the hairs on Arka's neck stand on end. Both the fox and the tiger, who had been locked in their struggle, suddenly froze. Their heads snapped in unison toward the dense shadows of the forest. There was another predator here.
A colossal shadow detached itself from the darkness. A bear, three times Arka's height, with powerful muscles rolling beneath its jet-black fur. Its eyes were not the eyes of a raging beast, but small black pits that glinted with cold and calculating intelligence. It stepped slowly into the small arena, unhurried, as if it were a king arriving to collect tribute.
The bear stopped, looming over the two critically injured fighters. It didn't roar. It simply observed. Its massive head swiveled slowly, looking at the seven-tailed fox trembling in pain, its body smaller and more fragile. Then, its gaze shifted to the saber-toothed tiger, which let out a weak growl, its body larger, more substantial.
Arka, from his hiding spot, could see the cruel logic in the bear's eyes. It didn't see two enemies. It saw two choices for a meal. And since it couldn't possibly carry both, it had to choose.
After an eternal silence, the choice was made.
With swift and horrifyingly brutal efficiency, the bear ignored the fox. It strode toward the tiger, and before the magnificent beast could retaliate, a paw the size of a small shield swung down. A sickening crack echoed through the forest, and the tiger collapsed without another sound, its life extinguished instantly.
The bear sniffed its prize, satisfied. It glanced one last time at the helpless fox, its expression blank and uninterested. The smaller prey wasn't worth the effort. With a low grunt, it heaved the massive tiger carcass onto its broad shoulder and, without a backward glance, vanished back into the dense woods.
The forest fell silent again, leaving only a trembling Arka and the seven-tailed fox lying on the verge of death—a victim not only of its foe, but of the cold calculations of this world's law of survival.
With his heart still pounding, Arka dared to approach. The fox's once-beautiful silver fur was now stained with dark red and mud. As Arka drew near, the fox lifted its head. Its eyes held no hatred or fear, but a deep intelligence and a desperate plea. With great effort, the majestic creature rose, its body swaying. It looked at Arka one more time, then turned and limped away, glancing back occasionally as if to say, "Follow me."
An impulse he didn't understand compelled Arka to obey. He followed the trail of blood to a small den hidden beneath the roots of a giant tree. Inside, three small bundles of fur huddled in fear. Three fox cubs, each with only a single tail, stared back at him with wide, terrified eyes.
The mother fox looked at Arka one last time. In that gaze, Arka saw everything: a mother's plea, a surrender to fate, and the final trust given to a complete stranger. Then, her strength left her for good. She collapsed with a soft sigh and moved no more.
Arka stood frozen, the air caught in his throat. In this cruel new world, where he had nothing and knew no one, he had just been given a heavy responsibility. He knelt, extending a trembling hand toward the orphaned cubs.
"...You... want me to look after them?" he whispered to the mother's still form.
With a heavy heart full of a strange new purpose, Arka gathered the three cubs into his arms. Their small, warm bodies were a stark contrast to his own cold loneliness.
"Alright..." he promised to the silent forest and to the spirit of the mother fox. "From now on... I'll take care of you."
He had no idea that this single, compassionate act would become his first anchor in this foreign world, altering the course of his life forever.